by Karon Brandt

Created on: April 21, 2009   Last Updated: February 05, 2010

Your article is ranked in last place! You worked so hard on it. Are the raters doing their jobs? Is there a "raters' conspiracy" on Helium?

Understand the "publication" you are writing for. Helium is an article directory and a self-monitored writing community. Helium is a modern-age business venture in which quality written articles are brokered to publishers for cash. "Quality" writing is wanted and rewarded.

Writers must understand the value of Helium's proprietary rating system and how it works so they can "play the game" to their best advantage. Writers must rate their peers' articles so only the best are pushed to the top for public viewing.

The "Helium game plan": All writers must earn one gold rating star to receive monthly payouts for their works. That means each writer must do 10 quality rates (no random "this-is-better" button-pushing allowed) in 30 days or 30 in a 90-day rollover to earn one gold star.

Writers also earn blue stars for writing and are given merit pay according to how many articles they write, how the articles rank, how many page views the articles get, and how much advertisers are willing to put into the channels they write for.

Helium's algorithm-based system (along with other clever, objective mathematics) gives rating percentages based on quality rates. All writers are strongly encouraged to "vote" for the "better" article as they are presented in anonymous, side-by-side pairs. Raters are told to choose the one they feel is "more relevant" and "more valuable."

With all of the complaints about Helium's "secretive," proprietary system, check out the results objectively before you complain too much. Notice that four- and five-star writers tend to be near the top, consistently. You might find a "stray" once in a while, but once a title group reaches consensus, the final results are ranked relatively "correctly." Helium is constantly looking for a "better" system but hasn't found one.

Look at a "knowledge group" (see the 27 channels on the left side of Helium's front page, from Arts and Humanities" to "Travel") which invites fact-based articles, which earn upfront fees (except for Creative Writing), a possible bonus dollar for being the first to write to the title, and ongoing earnings from page views that become more than pocket change.

Understand your "employer." Look at Helium with the eyes of a professional writer. Creative writers are encouraged to come to Helium and write. They earn badges of recognition and a portion of ongoing

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